


Refuge

by Fyre



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe, Alternate Universe - Canon, Domestic Violence
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-05-04
Updated: 2012-05-04
Packaged: 2017-11-04 20:18:27
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings, Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,024
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/397819
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fyre/pseuds/Fyre
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In the depths of winter, a visitor comes knocking at the doors of the Dark Castle in desperation.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Refuge

**Author's Note:**

> Please be warned this fic totally did not go the way I expected it to. I was expecting to be writing Rumbelle fluff by bedtime, and instead ended up with 13,000 words of character-based semi-angst. Still, I'm fond of it :)

Few people ventured into the lands of the terrible Rumpelstiltskin.

It was said they were an overgrown wasteland, wild and treacherous. It was said that dragons roamed to devour unwitting intruders. It was said that whoever stepped across the boundaries into his dominion was changed into something monstrous and terrible, a slave to Rumpelstiltskin’s will.

Rumpelstiltskin knew it was all nonsense, but rumours never did any harm, and left him in peace to pursue his quest for the curse to tear the boundaries of the world.

That was why the knock at his door was a surprise. 

It was quiet, but the enchantments bound in his defences, it echoed around his study in the highest tower as if it was the very door of the chamber.

Rumpelstiltskin gazed at the bottle in his hand, then set it down on the table.

Intriguing.

It took someone very bold to seek out his castle, in the middle of winter, in the dead of night.

He was in the hall in a blink of an eye, and shadows wreathed him as the doors swung inwards. A slight figure was standing there, wrapped in a cloak, shivering, and it stumbled into the hall almost as soon as he opened the doors.

The hood of the cloak was pushed back, revealing the gaunt face of a woman who was probably young, but her every moment spoke of utter exhaustion. She walked as if she were a hundred years old. She had dark hair and shadow-ringed blue eyes, and her lips were dry and cracked with frost.

"Hello?" she said nervously, looking around. "Hello, is someone here?"

Rumpelstiltskin giggled, the sound echoing off the walls, and she whirled around.

"Please," she said, her voice trembling, her desperation as sharp as the winter wind whistling through the open doors.

He stepped out of the shadows behind her, framed in the doorframe, his silhouette cast over her by the moonlight. "What brings you to my home, dearie?" he purred, almost giggling again when she spun around with a frightened cry.

Her blue eyes were wide, and the pupils contracted to pinpricks. Her breath was coming in rapid puffs of condensation, and he took a deliberate step towards her to watch her shrink backwards. 

"Well?" he said, spreading his hands. "Did you come to stare at the monster, dearie? Because I find that rather tiresome." He raised one hand, pulsing flickering magic gathering around his fingertips. "Speak, dearie, and speak swiftly."

To his surprise, she fell to her knees, raising her hands in supplication. "No, please, please, sir," she gabbled. "I-I came to you for help."

He dismissed the magic with a flicker of his fingers. "Go on," he murmured.

"I-I need protection, m'lord," she whispered, her hands still raised. They were trembling, and he could see the scratches and cuts where she had pushed through the coarse briars that circled his castle. "I seek asylum in your household."

Rumpelstiltskin stared at her, genuinely surprised. "Asylum, dearie?" he finally said. "What manner of household do you believe this to be? A place of refuge for foolish women and lost children?"

She looked up at him, the desperation and terror naked on her face. "A place of power," she whispered. "Please, I'll do anything. Don't send me away."

He circled her, and she cowered down, but did not flinch from him. She wasn't lying. Desperation hung on her like a badly-shaped cloak, weighing her down and twisted around her. It was suffocating her, though her attire said she was a noble, and the nobles had little to concern them aside from whether their latest dress was rich enough or their food luxurious enough.

"Why?" he said, stepping in front of her and catching her chin in his hand, forcing her to look up at him. 

She stared at him, and he could smell the fear, rank on her. She was afraid of him, yes, but there was something she feared more, and that was intriguing. "I have nowhere else I can go," she said, her voice trembling. She hesitated, then grasped his hand, her own hands ice-cold and trembling. "Please, don't send me away."

He pulled his hand from hers, curling his fingertips against his palm. "And what, pray, am I to do with a woman?"

She looked up at him, wet her lips, then lowered her gaze.

Rumpelstiltskin almost laughed in disbelief. "Well, well," he murmured. "You must be truly desperate if you would spread your legs for a monster, rather than be cast back into the world." He bent over her, forcing her chin up with one clawed fingertip. "You overestimate your appeal, dearie."

She looked up at him again, tears spilling down her face. "Please," she whispered. "I-I can clean for you. Cook. Anything you need. If you would have me, you can."

He put his head to one side. Desperation this raw was rare. "Would you skin the children I hunt?"

She recoiled from him, but lowered her head, nodded.

He stepped around her so she would not see his expression. It was tempting, simply to see how far she would go. "Very well," he murmured. "You will be bound to my household. You will do any duty I ask of you. You will not question what I do. In exchange, you will be safe within these walls."

"If someone came for me...?" The question hung in the air, softly significant.

So that was the matter, was it?

He turned to look down at her. Her head was bowed and she was sitting heavily on her heels. 

"If you give yourself in exchange for refuge," he said, "refuge you will have. You will obey and you will not question. You will accept any duty I ask of you, even if it displeases you. You will be my servant. This is my price for your refuge." He smiled thinly. "Do we have a deal?"

She looked up at him, pale but clear-eyed. "Yes."

He snapped his fingers and the doors slammed closed. Candles sprang to life along the walls, lighting the hall, and he picked up a three-branched candlestick.

"This way," he said, without looking back. 

The woman rose, stumbling after him. He could hear the damp fabric of her cloak dragging on the tiles of the floor, and her steps were shuffling. No small wonder, if she had come to his mountain den on foot. He was curious what made her run so far, so desperately. He could ask. After all, she was a servant and a servant would have to obey.

It could wait, though.

He led her through the castle to a solitary cell. Well, she hadn't negotiated for comfort. "This will be your room, dearie," he said with a chilly smile. "You'll see the rest of the castle tomorrow, and your duties will be confirmed then."

She surprised him then, by curtseying shakily. "Thank you, sir," she whispered. 

He snorted, shoving her into the cell and closing the door behind her.

Quite what he was going to do with a servant, he didn't know.

 

_____________________________________________________

 

When morning came, Rumpelstiltskin opened the door of the woman’s cell.

She went from asleep to upright and shrunk back against the wall in a matter of seconds, and for a moment, seemed disorientated. He watched her impassively, his hands folded behind his back, as she took stock of her surroundings, caught her breath, and slowly moved forward.

“Well, dearie,” he said. “Your duties await.”

She ducked her head in a half-bow and fell into step behind him.

It was like being followed by a half-lame shadow. Her every step rustled on the ground, as if her feet pained her after her journey, but she barely made any other sound.

He led her to the kitchen, pushing the door wide. There was a fire burning already, and for the first time, she moved ahead of him, hurrying to crouch by the flames, her hands held out and trembling to the blaze. 

“This will be your place,” he murmured. “You will begin by cooking, cleaning, and tending to the castle.” She looked up at him warily through the tangled strands of her hair. “You will serve me my meals in the hall on the level above this one. You will tend my clothing and my collection.”

The pale tip of her tongue darted out to wet her cracked lips. “A-and the children?”

His lip twitched. “That was merely a quip, dearie,” he said, inclining his head. “I find them too stringy to be filling.” 

She stared at him blankly, then, after a moment, her lips almost moved in a smile. “Another quip?” she asked in a hoarse whisper.

He bared his teeth in a half-grin, his eyes glittering. “Perhaps.” He made a shooing gesture with one hand. “Now, no more loitering by the fire. You have your duties. I expect breakfast within the next half hour.”

She straightened up stiffly and bowed again. “Yes, sir.”

Some half an hour later, he was seated at his wheel, spinning. The door of the room creaked cautiously open and he slanted a look over his shoulder to see the woman carefully struggle in bearing a tray that looked far too heavy for her. His lips twitched. At least, he thought, she was showing willing.

He waited until he heard the rattle of crockery on the table, then slowed the wheel and rose.

She looked up at him with no small measure of trepidation as he stepped down from the small dais that housed the wheel and baskets of straw and gold. She had shed her cloak, at least, but she tangled her hands in the long sleeves of her dress, as if that might hide the fact they were trembling again.

Rumpelstiltskin studied the contents of the tray. The bread was clumsily cut, but she had made a brave attempt at cooking eggs. The yellow mass was heaped beside pieces of meat. He ignored the bits of shell he could see sticking out here and there. 

He looked at her. “Tell me, dearie,” he said, “have you ever cooked before?”

She ducked her head, shook it. “N-no, sir,” she stammered. “I can try again…”

He drew one of the chairs out and motioned for her to sit too. “It looks edible,” he said, looking at her thoughtfully. The bread was on a smaller side-dish, and he pushed it off, then scrapped some of the mountain of eggs and meat onto the plate, which he then held out to her.

“I don’t understand,” she said warily. “It… it isn’t poisoned, I promise.”

Rumpelstiltskin looked at her, head to one side. “Dearie, it’s breakfast,” he said, “I didn’t ask if it was poisoned. I thought you might be hungry.”

She stared at him in confusion.

He sighed and set the plate down in front of her, when she didn’t seem inclined to take it from him. “Eat,” he said. “You look like a skeleton fresh from the dirt. You’ll be no use to me at all if you starve to death.”

She looked down at the dish, then took the spoon from the teacup and started eating so quickly, he was amazed she didn’t choke. It was if she was afraid he would steal the very food from her mouth. 

He took his time over his own, discreetly brushing bits of shell to one side, one eye on his new, apparently famished servant. Now that he looked closer, she was unusually thin for a woman of the aristocracy, inclining very much towards malnourished. 

She set the spoon down when the plate was completely cleared. “Thank you,” she said, looking from it to him, then back.

“Thank you for feeding you?” Rumpelstiltskin snorted, taking a bite of the thick wedge of bread. 

She shrugged, back to playing with the ends of her sleeves. “Some masters don’t,” she said quietly. 

He noted that information, her appearance, and carefully closed it away for further perusal at his leisure. He picked up one of the remaining slices of bread and set it on her empty plate, aware of her gaze on him. “I am not that manner of master.”

She looked from him to the bread and back. As if scarcely daring to believe it, she picked the bread up and nibbled on the edge of it. Even though she tried to keep her eyes lowered, she glanced at him, wary and suspicious, every few moments, watching him as much as he was watching her.

She set the bread down, a large portion untouched, and lowered her hands to her lap, where they tangled together again. She licked her lips, chewed them, toying with some idea or other.

Rumpelstiltskin leaned back in his seat, watching her in silence. There was a question brewing, and she was afraid to speak, afraid to ask. He waited until she raised her head enough to glance at him and nodded. “Ask.”

She licked her lips again. “Why?” she finally said.

“Why, dearie? You’ll have to be a little more specific.”

She made an abortive gesture towards him, her hand twitching uneasily back to her lap to join its twin. “Why did you let me in?”

He shrugged expressively, spreading his hands. “Why not?” he said with a wholly unpleasant smile. “Few people throw themselves willingly at my feet and offer themselves in servitude. I see no reason not to take full advantage.”

She looked down at her hands, her knuckles sharp and white. “And my…” She swallowed hard, and he could see she was terrified, once more. “My other offer?”

He tilted his head back to rest against the back of the chair, his eyes half-closed. “Was that offered in earnest or desperation, dearie?” he murmured. “For at this moment, all I can smell is your terror and shame.”

It was no surprise that she was on her feet and halfway from the room in a heartbeat.

“Wait,” he said, soft enough not to scare her further, but loud enough to be heard.

She stopped dead, as if he had caught her with a wire. She was rigid, shivering, and lowered the hand that was outstretched to the door. If the air had been thick with fear before, now, it felt like it was scouring the room like flame. 

He pushed his chair back, resting his fingertips on the table. “Look at me, dearie,” he said.

She turned slowly to face him, her hands a tight knot in front of her waist. Her nails were bitten to the quick, edged with blood. She raised her eyes to him, but she was inching away, little by little.

Rumpelstiltskin studied her, this frightened little mouse of a woman. He had no doubt that she was not a coward. No coward crossed mountains in winter to seek service to a monster. It was the act of someone who was desperate, but brave enough to face the horrors of his house over whatever lay behind. There was bravery there, a foundation beneath the fear.

“What’s your name?” he asked, folding his arms over his chest.

Her brow creased in confusion. “B-Belle, sir.”

“Belle.” He walked out from behind the table and approached her. She shrank back a step, her eyes fixed on his face. “As I told you last night, you overestimate your appeal. Do not imagine that the fact you are a woman is enough to woo me into bedding you.” He leaned closer, until their faces were inches apart. “You are my servant. You will tend my castle. You will cook my meals. You will clean.” He inclined his head, just a fraction. “That is all.”

Her eyes widened. “All?” she breathed.

His nose wrinkled and he grinned, just a little wickedness in it. “Unless I find some especially tasty children.”

He wasn’t sure who was more surprised when she gave a small giggle.

 

_________________________________________________

 

 

Her eggs improved with time.

It became a ritual they shared each morning. She would make breakfast and join him in the room where he would be spinning at the wheel. She would serve him his food, he would fill a smaller plate from his own, and they would sit and eat together.

She seldom talked, but she listened as he spoke of duties she could carry out. Her feet seemed to be recovering, though he noticed that she still limped, favouring her left leg. She was less hasty when she ate, which he considered a good sign. There was little of the quivering terror anymore. She seemed to be gradually accepting that he wanted her only as a servant, and that if she did as instructed, she would be left in peace. 

It was strange, the small differences she made around the castle.

Windows that he hadn’t noticed as dirty suddenly let in cascades of sunlight. Curtains were once more vibrant and colourful with the dust severely beaten out of them. The cobwebs were brushed away. Even his spinning wheel had not been neglected: the rim was polished to gleaming, and the mechanism was oiled.

She worked her fingers to the bone, determined to prove herself useful. Sometimes, if he chanced to be in the same room as she was, he would watch from the corner of his eye. She never cut corners, never took short-cuts, never did anything less than perfectly. She didn’t want to disappoint.

The more he watched, the more he was beginning to understand.

In her life, there had been cruelty, he had no doubt. She expected to be punished if anything went awry. He found that out by accident, when he ventured into the kitchen after returning early from matters outwith the castle.

Belle was cleaning - again - in the kitchen. He entered silently, without thinking, and only said her name when he was two paces from her. She dropped the dish she was holding, and it shattered on the floor.

At once, she was on her knees on the floor, scrabbling for the pieces.

“I’m sorry!” she gasped out, gathering all the shards up between her hands. She hardly seemed to notice she was slicing her fingers to ribbons. “I didn’t know you were back. I-I-I should have been more careful. Paid more attention.”

Rumpelstiltskin went on one knee, catching her wrists in his hands, and the look of blind terror in her face took his breath away. “It’s only a plate, dearie,” he said gently. Her hands were trembling against his wrists, blood staining the silk of his sleeves, and she stared at him, wildly, too afraid to pull away. “Hush now. I have dozens of the things.”

“It broke,” she whispered. “I didn’t mean to.”

“I know, dearie,” he murmured. “Entirely my fault.”

It took no effort at all to draw her to her feet by her forearms. He guided her over to the table and gently sat her down. 

“I should clean it up,” she said, looking over at the broken plate blankly. “I should clean. I shouldn’t leave a mess.”

“It can wait,” Rumpelstiltskin said. “I order you not to touch it, do you hear me?”

Belle looked up at him with such dazed confusion that he felt as if he had been struck. “It’s a mess,” she said plaintively. “I can’t leave a mess.”

“Only for a moment,” he said, drawing a kerchief from his coat pocket. “Now, hold this in your hands until I return, dear. Gently, mind.” He closed her torn fingers around the cloth, to catch the worst of the blood. She didn’t even seem to notice she was bleeding.

When he returned, only minutes later, she was still sitting where he had left her. He couldn’t help notice she was rocking slowly back and forward, and her eyes were fixed on the broken plate as if it was the sign of the end of the world. 

Rumpelstiltskin fetched a small bowl of water, then drew up a chair alongside hers. He set the bowl down on the table, as well as the small wooden box he had fetched, then gently but firmly lifted her chin. He turned her face towards his, away from the shattered plate.

“Look at me, Belle,” he said, lowering the pitch of his voice, keeping it calm, even though he wanted to find the one who had driven her to this level of fear and crush them to dust. “Look at me.”

Blue eyes, blank, barely focussing, rose obediently. 

He bent his head closer, until they were all but nose to nose. “I said _look_ at me,” he said, a growl beneath the words. That broke through the torpor and she jerked as if he had struck her, staring wildly at him. Her breathing was growing rapid, and he caught her hands quickly, still closed around his kerchief, wrapping both of his gently around hers. “Listen to me,” he said, softening his tone, now that she was listening. “It was only a plate. It was my fault. I startled you. You don’t need to worry.”

“But it broke,” she whispered, and he had to look away when tears rolled down her cheeks. “I shouldn’t have dropped it.”

“I shouldn’t have startled you,” he corrected, opening her hands around the kerchief and gently drawing the cloth free.

She looked down at her trembling fingers, then up at him. “I’m bleeding?”

He nodded. “My fault,” he said quietly. He lifted down the bowl of water, then added ointments from the wooden box, only a few drops. The water shimmered oddly, and he lifted her unresisting hands into the bowl. Strands of blood coiled like smoke through the water and she bit down on her lower lip. “Sorry, dearie, but I won’t have you wounded and festering.”

She gazed down into the bowl. "Not useful," she whispered unhappily.

"Not acceptable," Rumpelstiltskin corrected. He fetched a fresh towel from one of the cupboards, and returned to sit, facing her. He spread the towel across her lap. She flinched as if he had thrust his hand beneath her skirt, rather than simply laying a towel on top of it. "I won't hurt you, dearie."

She nodded, swallowing hard. He could practically feel the doubt and disbelief rolling off her, but elected to ignore it. He lifted her right hand from the bowl and onto the towel, then the left. The ointments had done their work, the cuts no longer bleeding. 

Patiently, he towelled each hand dry, then checked the cuts, lest any need stitching.

They were painful and ugly, but fortunately, not one of them was deep enough to merit further attention. All the same, he studied her shivering fingers curiously. The smallest finger on her left hand was crooked, as if it had been broken and badly-set some time before. There were tiny scars as well, he noticed, barely visible and faded with age, as if she had caught a broken glass in her palm.

"They don't hurt," she said in a small voice, drawing his attention back to her face. "The cuts."

"Nevertheless," he said briskly, withdrawing his hands from beneath hers. He reached into the box and took a small vial of ointment. "A little of this in the evening and the morning will help them to heal more quickly." He held it out between forefinger and thumb. She looked at it uncertainly and he gave it a shake. "Do I have to order you to take it, dearie?"

She took it carefully, as if it might burn her, and looked up at him, confused. "Thank you."

He waved away her words. "No matter," he said. With a gesture and a flicker of magic, the shattered plate vanished as well. "Consider it recompense for your wounds."

She nodded, curling her fingers around the bottle as if it were something precious.

 

______________________________________________

 

 

Rumpelstiltskin found himself growing used to Belle's company.

That surprised him more than anything else.

While having a servant had proved beneficial in many ways, he wondered how he could have gone so long in such complete isolation. She still talked little, but when she looked at him now, she occasionally ventured a tentative smile. 

They took every meal together, and her gaunt face had filled out a little. She would listen as he told her of deals struck, of places he had seen, and sometimes, she even daringly asked questions about the regions he had visited.

She still worked from the moment she rose until the moment she retreated to her room. She was often awake before he was, so he no longer locked the door. The only chamber she had not touched was his bed chamber, and that was a matter he did not need to press. 

He was surprised one morning when he entered the spinning room and found it flooded with sunlight. Belle was standing by the windows, carefully and methodically folding the curtains that had once kept the room in quiet darkness. She looked up at him, offering one of her rare smiles.

"What are you doing?" he inquired, putting his head to one side.

"Letting some light in," she said, touching the window. "It'll be spring soon." She looked back at him, wary hopefulness on her face. "I-I can put them back, when they're clean. If you like."

He gazed at her, then looked around the room, which seemed so much larger and warmer now, with sunlight pouring in. She was practically glowing too, and she looked happy. This was the room they shared, and she wanted to put some little of herself into it.

"I'll get used to it, I think," he said, crossing the floor towards her. 

She looked up at him, and it took him a moment to realise why. She had only ever seen him by the light of a fire or candles, never by daylight. Her eyes searched his features, as if trying to understand what he was, then she ducked her head, blushing.

"Sorry," she mumbled.

Rumpelstiltskin smoothed the edge of his waistcoat self-consciously. "Staring at the beast, hmm?"

She shook her head and peeked up at him again. "You glisten," she said. "Like gold."

He looked back at her in surprise. Most compared him to a snake or some other equally loathed reptile. "I hardly think so," he snorted, stepping back out of the light and into the safer shadow. To his surprise - and hers it seemed - she reached out and caught his hand, drawing him back into the daylight.

"Look," she said, turning his hand over in hers, the light glancing off his skin. She looked up at him shyly. "Like the gold in your basket." He stared at her in mute bewilderment, and she blushed again, dropping her hands away.

He curled his fingers to his palm, looking down at the shimmering skin. "I'm hardly gold, dearie," he murmured.

She hugged the heavy bundle of curtains to her chest. "No," she agreed, then whispered, "Better."

She all but fled from the room, and he was left staring after her.

Perhaps it was cowardice to take refuge in deals in distant lands. It distracted him, at least momentarily, from the memory of her hands willingly around his, and of the small, shy smile she had given him. It was a complication that he certainly had not anticipated when he took her into his service.

It was simply because he had shown her kindness, of that he had no doubt.

What manner of world was it when the monsters were considered kind?

He returned with the night, much later than he normally would. He went to the spinning room immediately, and was struck with a rare pang of remorse at the sight of a meal set out for him. It was cold, and had been for some time, and he was unsurprised to see that his little housekeeper's plate had been unused too. Was she still so nervous that she would not eat alone?

A sound behind him made him turn sharply.

The fire was burning low in the grate, but the sound came from the large chair before it. He approached, catfooted, and looked over the back. Belle was curled up there, her arms resting on the arm of the chair, a woollen shawl wrapped around her. She was fast asleep.

Rumpelstiltskin watched her for a moment, then circled the chair and crouched down. He touched her hand gently, rousing her. "Belle."

Blue eyes opened sleepily. "You're home," she murmured, her eyes drifting closed.

"You should be in your room, dearie," he said with mock-sternness. "This is no place to sleep."

"Mm."

He sighed, then easily slipped his arms beneath her thin little body. To his surprise, she didn't flinch or recoil from him. Instead, one arm slid over his shoulder, holding on to him in complete trust. He rose, her weight barely anything in his arms, and stood still and silent.

She trusted him.

That was another new and wholly unexpected development.

Keeping his steps as light as he could, he carried her down to the room that had always been allocated as her. It was as neat as the rest of the castle was, but he couldn't help but notice that she was only sleeping on a thin blanket over a bed of straw. Another blanket was folded beside it.

Tomorrow, he decided, she would have a better room, with a bed and pillows. After all the work she had put into the castle, it seemed unnecessarily cruel to close her away in a cell night after night. 

He went on one knee carefully and laid her down on the straw-bed. She murmured something nonsensical and rolled onto her side, curling up in a ball, one arm folded over her belly, the other tucked beneath her head. He reached for the other blanket to cover her, then paused, frowning. There was something hidden beneath the blanket.

He glanced at her, but she seemed dead to the world, so he lifted the blanket, wondering what treasures or potions she might have considered worth stealing for herself.

It was not what he expected.

There was a small basket from the kitchen, and within it, there were slices of salted meat, dried fruits, even slightly stale pieces of bread. The only object that was not food was the small bottle of healing potion he had given her. 

Rumpelstiltskin sat back on his heel, looking at her in bewilderment. The woman had access to the kitchen every day, to more food than any mortal woman could consume in a lifetime, and yet, she gathered a little hoard in her chamber. Did she expect to be locked away and starved? Was that something she had experienced before?

He set the basket to one side, then drew the blanket over her.

The more he learned about her, the more he wondered about her past. If she was starved and scarred by her past for so long, what could have changed that made things so much more unbearable that she came to him?

He brushed his hand lightly over her hair. "Rest well, dearie," he murmured, then rose and slipped from the cell like a shadow.

 

_____________________________________________

 

 

Rumpelstiltskin was a thorough creature.

His lands were a network of defensive spells and magics, woven as fine as cobweb over his whole domain. He knew when any crossed his borders. People often did, though they were unaware that it was so. Very few people knew just how far his lands extended.

When a large group crossed into his domain, while he was elsewhere, he hardly took note of them until the defences near the castle where plucked and tugged. Only the very boldest would try to approach the dark castle, and he reached out with his magic to seek their intent.

There was anger there, and a taste of vengeance, black and ugly. 

Rumpelstiltskin paused thoughtfully.

While the deal he was teasing from the Sister of East and West was tempting, an assault on his dominion would not be tolerated. He stepped into the ether, crossing the world in the breath of the wind. He planted his feet on the steps of his castle as the shadows sloughed from him, unveiling him to the intruders who were beating at the door.

"Well, well, well," he said, magic crackling about his fingers, "what have we here?"

The group scrambled back from the door, but found their escape route blocked by the master of the castle. The group was made up of a dozen men, ranging in age from young and foolish to old and glowering. All of them, he was pleased to note, had the wit enough to look afraid.

"Forgive our intrusion." The eldest of the ground stepped forward, a tall, broad-shouldered man only starting to bend with age. "We seek a woman who was last seen coming towards these lands." 

"A woman?" Rumpelstiltskin widened his eyes in mocking astonishment. So, he thought, she was right to suspect people would come after her. "I see before me a veritable army, and you are seeking a lone woman?" He grinned unpleasantly at them. "Is she a powerful creature? A witch perhaps? Some manner of siren?"

"She's a murderess." One of the younger men shouted out savagely. 

Rumpelstiltskin laced his hands before his chest, gazing at his unexpected guests. So, that was what his frightened little housekeeper was on the run from? The noose? "Is that so?" he said, skipping lightly towards them. "And tell me, little boy, what did this terrible creature murder?"

The young man glared at Rumpelstiltskin, only held back by one of the older, wiser men. "My brother."

Rumpelstiltskin slunk closer. He was slighter than every one of them, but this boy especially loomed over him, tall and dark and furious. "Your brother, dearie?" he asked, blinking with wide-eyed slowness. "Big, imposing creature like yourself? All build, no wit?"

The boy grabbed him by the front of his jacket with a snarl and Rumpelstiltskin giggled.

"Temper, boy," he cooed. "Unless you wish for your father to lose a second son."

"Leon!" One of the older men behind him tugged him back. "Your pardon, Rumpelstiltskin."

Rumpelstiltskin straightened his the front of his coat with both hands, but didn't take his eyes from the boy - Leon's face. "Your brother," he murmured, "you are like him, I expect?"

"Yes," Leon said sullenly.

Tall, broad, quick-tempered, and willing with fists.

Rumpelstiltskin smiled without humour. "I see, I see." He turned back to the eldest of the group, the one who had some sense at least. "Your son?"

The man shook his head. "My sister's son," he said. "Have you see the woman we seek?"

Rumpelstiltskin put his head to one side. "The rest of you, leave," he said. He pointed a single finger at the man. "I will speak only to you." The men massed around their leader uncertainly and Rumpelstiltskin waved a hand dismissively, his fingers sparking. "Be gone, dearies. You begin to bore me."

They fled down the steps and Rumpelstiltskin looked up into the lined face of the man. "Who is this woman you hunt?" he said, his voice low, his teeth bared. "I would have the tale."

"She was Gaston's wife," the man replied quietly. "They were wed some four years. Only two months past, he was found dead in their marital bed. She fled in the night, and all sources say that she was seen coming towards your lands."

Rumpelstiltskin steepled his fingers before his chest, gazing at the man. "Was she strong, this woman? Enough that she could kill a man as big your nephew?" The man hesitated then, and Rumpelstiltskin nodded slowly. "Small, then? Weak?" He stepped a little closer. "How was it done?"

The man met his eyes. "When he was drunk," he said.

"Hmm." Rumpelstiltskin tapped the tips of his forefingers against his chin. "A happy match, was it?"

The hesitation was there again. "It was a political alliance."

Pieces were falling into place, unpleasant and violent.

Rumpelstiltskin tapped his fingertips together thoughtfully. “And now, you seek to steal something that is mine?”

The man stared at him. “She is here?”

Rumpelstiltskin grinned as unpleasantly as he could. “A fresh young woman strayed into my lands,” he said with a repulsive giggle. “You know who I am, dearie. Do you believe I would let her wander free when I could make use of her?”

The man actually blanched, a look of horrified revulsion crossing his face. Rumpelstiltskin allowed himself a cackle of glee.

“Sir, the woman must face justice,” the man said carefully.

Rumpelstiltskin wrinkled his nose. “No doubt there would be beheading or hanging or some other such nonsense,” he said, waving a hand dismissively. “No, no. None of that. I like my new toy.” He leaned closer and spread his hand on the man’s chest. “I don’t give back my toys, dearie. Not for them to be chopped up and thrown away.” He widened his grin. “Not when I can have so much fun with them when they can breathe and cry and scream.”

The man’s tongue wet lips that were pale, shivering. “What will you do with her?” he asked, his voice hoarsened by horror.

Rumpelstiltskin rose on his toes, bringing his face as close to the man’s as possible, until he could taste the man’s staggered, panting breaths. “Whatever I please, dearie, whenever I please and however I please.” He curled one clawed nail under the man’s chin. “And you would have me stop?”

“Have you no mercy?”

Rumpelstiltskin grinned at him. “So speaks the man who would slay her?”

The man stood his ground, though he was pale and shaking. “Some would say better dead than in your hands. It would be swift, I swear. She has suffered enough.”

Rumpelstiltskin gazed at him, then whirled away, pacing across the terrace. The other men were clustered below, at the bottom of the staircase, watching with fear and trepidation. He scanned over them with eyes and magic, seeking out their hearts, the belief that brought them here, and he tutted, shaking his head.

“Children, children,” he said, clasping his hands to his heart. “You come here, you try to take my pretty little doll.” He swayed his head like a snake. “You would hurt her as much as I, every one of you. You, all so like that brother of yours.” He snorted. “Selfish.” He uncurled his fingers, and the air crackled around them. “You aren’t taking my toy from me.”

“Sir.” The man on the terrace moved forward a step, but a snap of Rumpelstiltskin’s fingers froze him in place.

“Hush, dearie,” Rumpelstiltskin purred, a blade encased in silk. “I’m talking.” He clapped his hands together, smiling wide and unpleasant. He had not killed in anger, not for a long time, but sometimes, just once in a while, there were would-be rapists who really earned everything that they were about to receive. “Children, dear children, I will only be as cruel as your own thoughts.” He giggled, then waved his hands grandly. “Run, little rabbits. The garden awaits you.” He walked down one step, then another. “If you reach the gates, I may just let you live. If not…” He shrugged expansively. “Your end will be of your own making. I’m sure you’ll enjoy it.”

“You can’t…” Leon began, but realised his friends were rapidly fleeing around him.

“Can’t?” Rumpelstiltskin skipped down the last three steps and right up to the swaggering young man. His hand struck, snake-like, catching the boy by the throat with finger and thumb. Rumpelstiltskin’s upper lip curled back from his teeth and with no effort at all, he brought the youth to his knees. “You came to my domain, boy,” he breathed. “You threatened something that I own and that I intend to keep.” He bent closer, tilting his head. “You wanted to have her, didn’t you? You wanted to show her how a woman should behave.” He tightened his grip on the boy’s throat. “I can read your heart and mind, boy. I can see what you want, and what you intended.” He was nose-to-nose with the gasping youth. “And you will never touch her - or any other woman - again.”

He stepped back, releasing the boy’s throat as if he were something dirty.

Leon scrambled back across the ground, half-crawling, half-running.

Rumpelstiltskin put his head slowly to one side, slowly running his thumbs along his fingertips. He could feel the crackle of energy, of the magic building throughout the garden around them. It was strangely refreshing to feel such anger for the first time in so many years, and to have an outlet.

He opened his palms and lightning surged and crackled down from the air, the air thick with the scent of power. The sky was blackening, and he could see the men running, in genuine terror. He laughed quietly. Their ends, he knew, would be of their own devising. Magic was cruel that way. He could condemn them to an end, but the price was that their own thoughts would guide the magic. And in men such as them, it would be a terrible, terrible end.

He brought his hands together with a thunderclap and fire rained down from the sky.

The screams started as he turned and ascended the staircase. He had no need to look around, the magic pulsing through him with every drop of blood spilled. The old man was still there, bound and watching in horror.

“Why?” he demanded, his face grey as his hair. 

Rumpelstiltskin looked at him with only a little pity. “Your sister married into a poisonous family,” he said. “You know this. I would rather trust the cruelty I know - my own - than hand over a trinket such as that woman to them, even for death.” He patted the man’s cheek. “It would not have been as merciful as you would have hoped.”

“They were just boys! Foolish boys!”

Rumpelstiltskin gazed at him. “They were,” he agreed, then wagged a finger slowly, “but that is no excuse, not ever.” He gestured vaguely towards the garden, where the screams were growing fainter and more desperate. “Anything that happened to them… I didn’t guide the magic to cruelty. They did that themselves.” He smiled, thin-lipped, showing no teeth. “I believe you were looking for justice?”

He turned and walked back towards the door. The old man folded over, retching.

Rumpelstiltskin paused with his hands on the handles of the doors. “You will be free to go shortly,” he said. “Consider this a… kindness, in exchange for your brand of mercy.” He slanted a look back at the old man. “Be sure your people know that I will keep what is mine.”

Without another word, he pushed the door open and walked into his home.

The grand entrance hall seemed very quiet and still compared to the screams and rage and magic flying outside. Rumpelstiltskin laid his hands against the closed doors and pressed his brow to the wood, willing himself to calm. If Belle was to see him now, a tempest of fury, he knew she would be terrified, and that, he could not allow.

A small, stifled sound made him turn. Another sound, a sob.

“Belle?” he said, soft, cautious.

He followed the sound to one of the small alcoves at the far side of the hall.

She was there, pressed so far back in that he could barely see her in the shadows. The sharp scent of urine and the acid of vomit clung to her, and when he crouched down to duck into the alcove, she screamed, slamming back so hard against the wall he feared she would do herself an injury.

“Belle, dearie,” he said softly, holding out his hands, letting the magic rise from them in a gentle glow to give them light. “It’s me. It’s only me.”

Blue eyes stared at his hands, and she reached out to touch them, as if barely daring to believe him. She was shaking so hard that she could barely steady her fingers around his, and she raised her eyes to his face. “You?”

He nodded. “Me, dearie,” he said. She surged towards him so suddenly that he fell off balance, and she was clinging to him as if he were the only thing keeping her afloat in a wild and stormy sea.

“Are they gone?” she whispered, her fingers biting into his back, even through his thick dragonhide coat.

He put his arms around her cautiously. “They are, dearie,” he murmured, “and they’re not coming back.”

All at once, she was sobbing. Not just soft, stifled sounds, but gulping, gasping sobs that sounded as if they might tear her in two. It was all he could do to hold her as the waves broke, and carefully smooth her sweat-heavy hair. It was not merely relief, he knew, but a release of everything she had carried with her since the moment she arrived on his doorstep weeks before.

It felt like minutes stretched to hours, until she was limp, exhausted, against his chest. Her tears were spent, and it felt as if she were as well. She barely had the strength to lift her hand to brush the tears from her flushed and swollen cheeks.

“To your room, I think,” he suggested quietly, slipping one arm beneath her legs, tangling in her sodden skirts, and another behind her back. She dragged one arm up to his neck and looked up into his face. He wondered for a moment what she was thinking, then she looked away, and laid her head on his shoulder, heavy with weariness.

It was barely any distance at all to her room. It was much more suitable than her cell had been, simple but elegant. He hesitated in the doorway, then looked down at the woman in his arms. 

“Would you bathe?” he asked quietly.

She nodded.

He licked his lower lip uncertainly. “Will you need… assistance?” he asked carefully.

“Please,” she whispered. “Tired.”

He looked down at her. She felt utterly spent, and now, he knew why. Why all the fear, why all the suspicion, why such surprise when showed her even a jot of kindness. She might have killed a man, but it was nothing compared to what the man had done to her.

Without further hesitation, he carried her to the small bathing chamber adjoining her room. It was an unnecessary luxury, and the first time she looked in on it, he was sure he almost saw her smile in amusement at it. There was a marble bench, so he set her down gently, then turned his attention to the heavy copper tub.

It took but a flicker of magic to draw water from the well far below them, filling the tub, then he drew his fingers through the water, heating it in swirling waves until it steamed gently.

She had few luxuries, he knew, but a little scented oil in the water was enough.

That done, he turned his attention to her. She had barely moved a breath, propped limply back against the wall. Her dress was soaked and stained and utterly past salvation. The stays were knotted and tangled by worried fingers, and he knew it would be impossible to untangle them all.

He knelt by the bench. “Dearie, I may have to cut you free,” he warned.

She reached out blindly with trembling fingers and brushed his cheek. “I trust you.”

He swallowed hard, darting his tongue along his lower lip, then drew a small dagger from the recesses of his coat. The stays snapped like cobwebs and he pulled them free. He frowned in confusion, aware that corsets were meant to confine, but Belle seemed to grow by more than a mere finger’s breadth or two.

“That must feel better,” he murmured, looking up at her.

Her eyes were open, though barely slashes of blue beneath dark lashes, and she was watching him warily. “Better,” she agreed in a whisper.

He moved his hands to help her disrobe, then hesitated. “You’re sure, dearie?” She nodded once more, her eyes closing, and he started drawing aside the dress. It was heavier than it looked, even without the fluids soaking it, and he drew her arms free first, then lifted her gently with an arm around the waist to draw it off.

Left in only the pale, thin shift, Belle looked even smaller and much more fragile. It clung to her in ways her heavy outer dress couldn’t and Rumpelstiltskin’s breath caught in shock, as he realised what he had overlooked.

He looked up at her face, and could see the tension and the fear. She trusted him with her, he knew, but this was something she had not mentioned.

He reached out and gently laid one hand over the curve of her belly. It wasn’t prominent, not yet, but then she was small and she had lacked sufficient food for a long time. Something moved within, and even without magic, he could feel the throb of another life.

“Belle,” he said quietly. She was biting on her lower lip, hard enough to draw blood, and fresh tears seeped from beneath her lashes. He moved his hand, gently, soothingly. “Belle, dearie, look at me.”

Blue eyes opened, only a little. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I should have said.”

He nodded. “You should have,” he replied. “This was why you came to me, wasn’t it?”

She nodded, tears splashing down her cheeks. “I didn’t want to lose this one too.”

Rumpelstiltskin’s mind went white, and for a moment, he wondered if it was too late to gather the pieces of the scattered army of fools and burn them to messes. It might even be worth risking necromancy to bring back the one she killed to slay him again, only in a way much more suitable. “Your husband,” he said in as calm a voice as he could, “should have been drowned at birth.”

She jolted. “They told you?” she whispered, shrinking back.

“They told me enough,” he murmured, “and I have seen enough.”

Belle’s breathing was growing ragged again, and he knelt up, catching her face between his hands, forcing her to meet his eyes. 

“Look at me, dearie,” he said, his voice level, calm, lower than usual. “Look at me. You are safe now. We made a deal, remember. Your service in exchange for refuge. No one can take you away from this place, unless we break our deal.” He nodded as she caught his meaning. “I never break a deal.”

She breathed in, then out, the air shivering between her lips. “Why?”

“Why, dearie?” he murmured, recalling their conversation on her first day as his servant. “I think you’ll have to be a little more specific.”

Her lips twitched weakly. “Why did you let me stay?”

He tilted his head to look at her. “No one can cook eggshells quite as well as you.” Belle almost smiled and he gently released her face. “Now, these clothes are soaked, and that won’t do either of you any good.”

It was only with a little bit of awkwardness that he started to pick away the remaining pieces of her clothing. There was nothing pleasant about it. Vomit and urine tended to dismiss any silly notions that this was some intimate encounter, and the more he revealed, the more tempted he was to go to find her marital seat and burn the damned place to the ground.

An unpleasant knot of tissue twisted across her right foot. It looked as if it had been broken, then left to heal unset. There were scars on her back, and he could see the shape of a belt buckle more than once. Tiny constellations of scars covered her arms and legs. There were even marks from a blade.

“He drank,” Belle said distantly. “And then, he was angry.”

“And you were there,” Rumpelstiltskin said quietly. “With your child.”

He wanted to dig up the corpse, twist it to life with magic, then watch it burn slowly and painfully. He wanted to hurt the man who hurt this woman, make him scream and writhe and beg. Instead, he gently lifted Belle from the bench into the tub, letting her sink into the warm water, one arm holding her steady.

“He had heirs already. First marriage.” She was holding onto his arm, staring into nothing. “It didn’t matter if there weren’t more. He didn’t care.”

“He was an idiot,” Rumpelstiltskin said succinctly, scooping water over her shoulders and dampening her hair. 

Belle’s head came to rest against his chest and he could feel the warmth of her damp hand through his sleeve. “He was,” she whispered, “and I killed him.”

He lowered his head and pressed his lips to her heavy, damp hair. “You or him,” he murmured, moving his free hand in gentle circles on her back. “When it comes to matters of survival, you do what you must.”

Her hand tightened on his arm, and she pressed her cheek to his chest, shivering as silent tears tan down her face. He murmured wordless nonsense, stroking her back, her hair, and let her weep.

 

___________________________________

 

 

Rumpelstiltskin was more than a little lost.

Brushing aside years of isolation was one thing, but brushing it aside and crushing those who threatened it was something else entirely. The woman who was his servant was not truly his servant. She hadn't really been that in weeks. The nail in that particular coffin had come when he unleashed hell on those who tried to claim her.

She didn't know what had become of them, and he did not feel particularly inclined to tell her. In the end, four of them reached the gates, bloodied and brutalised but alive. The eldest of the group was the only one to walk out with his body intact, if not his mind. 

She still insisted on cooking and cleaning, but now that he knew of her condition, he found himself keeping a closer eye on her. Any task that seemed to weary her, he forbade at once. Often, he instructed her to simply sit and rest by the fire in the evening, while he worked at the wheel. 

Without the need to hide the growing swell of her belly, she wore looser dresses and breathed more freely. He could only guess at how far along the pregnancy was, and she spoke little of the conception. She wanted the child, though. She had killed to protect the infant growing within her, and nearly died crossing the mountains to seek his protection. That kind of love was a defence more powerful than any magic.

Sometimes, she read in the evenings, and on other occasions, she would retreat to her chambers, but one quiet and rainy evening, she approached him at the wheel, watching the straw fly between his fingers, twisted into ribbons of purest gold. She stood in silence, watching for a time, one hand resting on her belly.

"Can you teach me?" she asked.

He looked up at her in surprise. "To spin gold, dearie? I fear not."

"To spin, then?" she asked with a tentative smile. "I used to watch the spinners in my village. It looked like magic."

He tilted his head, looking up at her. "Why?"

She shrugged. "You have made sure I can barely do anything now," she said with only a little reproach. He would have felt guilt if he hadn't seen how wearied she was when scrubbing and polishing. "Surely sitting and spinning isn't going to exhaust me too much."

Rumpelstiltskin looked at the thread resting in his hand, then curled his fingers around it. There was only one person he had ever taught to spin, many, many years before. Bae wasn't adept, not really, but he was always eager to try, even if he couldn't understand why the thread came out in clumped strands.

He was silent for so long that Belle fidgeted, and said uncertainly, "If you don't want to, it's all right."

Rumpelstiltskin looked up with an almost true smile. "Not at all, dearie," he murmured. "I was just wondering if I can remember how to spin anything but straw and gold."

It rang of bittersweet lies, and he suspected she could tell, but she simply nodded. "It's all right," she said. "I can read or sew or something."

He set down the thread he was holding. "Tomorrow, dearie," he said carefully. "We can try tomorrow."

A smile lit her face and she leaned down, one hand on his shoulder, and kissed him softly on the cheek. "Thank you."

Rumpelstiltskin patted her hand. "No matter, dearie," he murmured, watching her as she returned to the seat by the fire, curling up with her book. She was becoming too attached to him, he knew, and that could not bode well for her or the child she was carrying. 

All the same, the next evening, she tidied up their meal dishes, then looked over at the wheel.

"Wash your hands, dearie, then join me," Rumpelstiltskin murmured with a brief smile.

For the first time in generations, he had fetched wool while out during the day, and when she returned, he was carding it between two brushes. It had been a long time, but the motions came back as if he had done it only yesterday. 

"Does that untangle the wool?" she asked, sitting down at the second stool beside him.

He nodded, offering her the sharp-toothed brushes. "It must be as smooth as possible," he said, guiding her hands in dragging the wool over the prongs. She bit her lip in concentration, her hands gripping the handles of the brushes tightly. It took her a moment to find the rhythm and to start drawing against the resistant tugs.

"It's hard," she said, looking up at him with surprise.

He couldn't help but laugh quietly. "A sheep would hardly last any time at all if wool was fragile," he observed. He gently moved his hands around hers, showing how best to bring the brushes together. "Keep the strokes smooth."

When he deemed it carded well enough, he moved his own stool over a little and showed her the mechanisms of the wheel, from the spindle to the mother-of-all and the drive band. She recited them after him, touching each piece.

It was the work of a moment to start the wheel turning, and taking the wool she had carded to spin. Though not as fine as he wanted, he was relieved it didn’t turn to gold as it flew through his fingers. As simply as he could, he explained the method, his favoured techniques, the way to best tease the wool and keep the motion of the wheel steady.

“Can I…?” she asked softly.

 

He guided her to the stool in front of the wheel and rose to stand directly behind her. “Give me your hands, dearie,” he murmured. She did so without hesitation, and he let her set the pace of the wheel.

The moment she started to spin, the hand on the wheel stopped, her focus slipping, and the thread immediately knotted. “Oh!” she said, alarmed. 

“Concentrate,” he advised with a small smile. “I’ll guide the wheel.”

With his hand supporting hers, the wool started to twine together. Nowhere near as smooth as his, it wasn’t knotting this time, the motion of the wheel steady enough to allow it to twist into a solid thread.

Belle watched with rapt fascination as the wool drew through her fingers and his, as he guided the wheel. "You make it seem so simple."

He tilted his head to look down at her. It brought back so many memories, of Bae sitting where she was now, of the same wondering look in his son's eyes. She was younger by far than Bae would be now. He could have been this girl's grandfather. He could be a grandfather, great-grandfather even, if he found his child. 

"Anything can look simple, when you have practised as long as I," he murmured.

She turned her head to look at him and he averted his gaze. "How long?" she asked quietly.

He released her hand, and the thread almost immediately tangled as he slowed the wheel. "Long enough," he murmured, stepping back to give her room to move. He offered her a half-smile, brief, tired. "Perhaps, we can continue this tomorrow? It has been a long day."

She rose at once, smoothing her dress down, and he could tell she was confused, perhaps even hurt by his abrupt dismissal.

"Did I do something wrong?" she asked uncertainly.

"Not at all, dearie," he murmured. "Allow an old man his idiosyncrasies."

He waited until she left the room, then sat down on the stool, his hand brushing the rim of the wheel. He had been distracted, he realised. Distracted from his search for Bae, in his quest for the curse, by this woman who had thrown herself into his world.

Rumpelstiltskin leaned his head against his forearm. 

He couldn't and wouldn't cast her out. They had a deal after all. But he knew her presence would only slow his search. He breathed in, then out. He could not and would not ever break another deal. That was the promise he made himself that first night he spent alone in the darkness of the forest.

He remembered the desperation that drove him to tear at the ground with his bare hands and magic. He knew that was the same desperation that had driven her to him. 

Rumpelstiltskin drew a long breath.

Once her desperation was gone and forgotten, perhaps, perhaps, he could set her free.

 

_____________________________________________________________

 

Belle was a good student.

By the time spring crested towards summer, she was spinning as if she had been born to do so. While he spun gold, she spun wool, and he tried not to acknowledge the small clothes she was sewing and knitting. It made the thought of the child that would soon arrive all too real. 

She had bloomed in the weeks after her enemies were dealt with, no longer the gaunt, terror-cloaked waif who had knocked so desperately on his door in the middle of winter. Her eyes shone, her cheeks were flushed with life, and she smiled easily. Had he not seen the transition, he would hardly have believed her to be the same person. 

Rumpelstiltskin watched over her still, as if she were his own. He could see the change in her, a strange restlessness, and he knew that the birth was not far off. All deals were put to one side, for he knew that she could deal with many things, but the pain of labour alone would be an unnecessary cruelty.

The child, it seemed, was fated to be a tempestuous one.

A storm had been brewing in the mountains for days, the air thick and tight with the shifts in pressure. Belle was restlessly polishing the windows, as rain pattered against the glass, and he heard her cry out in surprise and alarm.

“Dearie?” he asked, rising from his seat at the table, where he had been studying an ancient spell book.

She looked at him, then down at her skirt and the spreading pool at her feet. 

He remembered that well enough and nodded briskly. “It is beginning,” he said, crossing the floor to offer her his arm. “It will be some time, but we should get you to your room. It will be more comfortable.”

She clung to him with a steely grip, and for the first time in many days, he saw fear in her bright eyes. “What if I can’t?” she whispered, as he guided her through the hall. “What if it’s too big? What if I can’t do it?”

He looked at her, then put his arm around her shoulder as comfortingly as he could. “You walked through the devil’s pass in the dead of winter to face a monster,” he said, not ungently. “You are more than capable of this.”

“And being a mother?”

That fear. That fear was another matter entirely.

“Do you want this child?” he asked, holding her steady. She nodded. “Will you love it and protect it no matter what?” She nodded again, then gave a small, sharp cry. A contraction, no doubt, the first of many to come. “Then you will be a mother.”

She stared at him, then smiled. It was tremulous, but real. “Thank you.”

He lifted one shoulder, avoiding her gaze. “The truth, dearie,” he said. “Why waste breath on lies?”

They reached her room moments later, and he helped her out of her sodden dress, and into a loose nightgown. She alternated between pacing the floor and sitting on the edge of the bed, as her contractions began in earnest.

Rumpelstiltskin distracted himself by bringing water and cloths for the birth. He had not been in a birthing room before, but when he had offered to fetch her a midwife, Belle had turned on him like a tigress. Strangers, she said, weren’t welcome.

It was late in the evening when the pains truly took hold, and she clung to the edge of the bed where she sat. Her knuckles were white and trembling, but she barely made a sound. Years of being subdued, he had no doubt, had left their mark.

“You needn’t be so quiet, dearie,” he offered, withdrawing bottles from his apothecary’s chest and mixing some of the contents into a glass of cool water. “There’s no one here to hear you cry out but me.”

“It’s unseemly,” she panted, lifting her face. She was flushed, sheened with sweat, and her hands were kneading at the bedding over and over. “Shows no restraint.”

He crouched down at her knees. “It’s childbirth, dearie,” he murmured, “Restraint has nothing to do with it.” He offered her the glass. “This will ease the pains if you wish it, but it may slow the birth.”

She stared at the glass, then him. “Less pain?” she asked, as if such a thing were impossible.

“If you wish it,” he murmured.

She pulled her hands from the bed, trembling, and took the glass from him. It was the first time she must have had the option, he realised. She closed her eyes and drained it without a second’s pause. One hand brushed a trickle from the corner of her mouth, and she released a shivering sigh.

“Thank you,” she whispered, “again.”

He lifted his hand to brush her hair back from her cheek, damp already. “You’ve had enough of pain,” he said quietly. “There’s little I can offer, but I give you that.”

She nodded wordlessly, then struggled to her feet, walking another careful circuit of the room, bracing one hand on the wall, the other resting on her belly.

It became the pattern again, for hours. She would walk until the contractions came, then she would sit, sometimes clasping at his hand, something digging her nails into the edge of the bed, sometimes simply breathing harder where she stood.

“I think,” she said hoarsely, stopping by the window, “it’s coming.”

“The bed, then,” he murmured, offering his arm.

She looked at him. Her pupils were wide, black. “No,” she whispered. “Here. I want to see the day.”

He looked at the window, then at her. “The window ledge is hardly big enough.”

“I don’t care,” she said. “Please. If I die, I want to see the day first.”

“You won’t die.” It came out more snarl than spoken.

Belle sank to sit on the cushioned stone with a weak smile. “Still,” she murmured.

She won, in the end. It was partly by choice, but partly because he drew up her nightdress and the child was already crowning. The stubborn creature had not even noticed the child was halfway to dropping out of her.

“Ah,” he said, grimacing. 

Belle leaned back against the window’s stone frame, bracing her hand on the leaded glass, her eyes heavy and half-closed. “I’m tired,” she breathed.

“You’re drugged,” he countered, darting back and forth to fetch the water and the cloths from beside the bed, “and you have been up all night to say nothing of the fact you are giving birth to a well-sized child.”

She looked at him. “You will look after her,” she murmured, her voice slurred.

“Nonsense,” he snapped. “You will.”

Belle’s fingertips squealed against the glass and she groaned. He could see her belly contracting and knelt by her feet. It was not a position he had ever expected to be in, and the mess was verging on the intolerable. Still, the head was crowning well, and he moved his hands to help it slide free.

“Very good, dearie,” he murmured. “You’re close.”

She pressed her head back against the stone, her eyes squeezing shut. “Hurts.”

“I imagine so,” he said, looking up, “but you’re almost done. You’ll be done by morning.”

“Is morning,” she whispered, tilting her head to the cool glass, condensation misting the polished surface. “Sun is coming.”

He raised his eyes to her face. “And so is your little one, dearie,” he said. “Once more.”

She barely even groaned with the last push. The child slipped out of her as if a cord holding it was severed, all but landing in Rumpelstiltskin’s waiting hands, all blood and gore and small, flapping limbs. He bundled it into a cloth and rubbed at the rumpled skin until it gave a damp, plaintive wail.

Belle’s eyes opened. “Alive?”

“Both of you are,” Rumpelstiltskin murmured. He opened the cloth around the wrinkled little creature, sealing the cord and severing it with a hiss twist of magic. He looked up at the exhausted woman above him. “You have a daughter, Belle.”

She held down trembling arms and he rose, letting her take the baby, cradling her close.

“Mine,” she whispered fiercely. “My Aurora.”

 

___________________________________________________

 

 

The child was a joy, but she was also a torment.

Every time Rumpelstiltskin looked at her, he was reminded of the infant that Baelfire had once been. He remembered returning from the war to the small, wailing bundle, the child who quieted when he sang old lullabies, the baby who didn’t care that he was a coward and had run away. Even when his wife abandoned them, Bae was there, wide-eyed and trusting and loving without thought or hesitation.

Aurora was purely her mother’s child. 

She was bright-eyed and was sitting upright within a matter of months. She crawled soon too, and laughed and smiled. She brought a fresh strength to Belle, who doted on her. The woman was ripe for motherhood, and she beamed on her child’s every accomplishment.

Unfortunately, sleeping through the night seemed to be one skill that the infant was doing well without.

Rumpelstiltskin returned from tasks abroad, deep in the night, and could hear the child’s cry as soon as he crossed the threshold of the Dark Castle. It took only moments to reach the spinning chamber, where Belle was walking the floor, looking half-dead on her feet.

“She won’t sleep,” she said wearily, when he approached. “Two nights now, and she won’t sleep.”

“There are enchantments…”

“No,” Belle said at once. “No magic.” She rocked Aurora closer to her shoulder, her steps stumbling with exhaustion. “I won’t have her put into an enchanted sleep, just so I can rest.”

Rumpelstiltskin toyed with his cuff, watching them. He tended to avoid touching the child, or even going near her as much as he could. It hurt too much to see what could have been, if he had been brave for a moment. Every moment he saw mother and child, he was only reminded of the failure he had been as a father, and the failure he continued to be in his vain attempts to find his way back to his son.

“I could,” he offered quietly. “I could try, at least.”

Belle looked at him, doubtful, confused. “You would?”

He hesitated only a moment, then nodded. “You need to rest, dearie,” he murmured, approaching her. His coat was shed, forgotten, over the back of one of the chairs. He tried to ignore the tremor in his hands as he offered his arms for the crying child. 

Belle placed Aurora in his arms at once, murmuring to mind her head, as if he had not been the one to teach her that very thing, the night of the child’s birth. The baby continued to wail, shrill and keening, but he rocked her gently, only a little awkwardly.

“You go and rest,” he said, unable to look up, to face her, to see her expression. 

She had tried to have him involve himself with her and the child almost from the moment Aurora had first drawn breath, but he couldn’t bear it, couldn’t stand to watch another child grow and be lost to him. 

He only raised his head when he heard the door close softly behind her.

“There, little dearie,” he whispered, looking down at the infant. “You’ve been tormenting your mama long enough, haven’t you?” He rocked her gently lifting her up to rest against his chest and rubbed her back. She continued to complain fretfully. Rumpelstiltskin drew on magic to dim the candles to a soft glow, then hummed softly, rocking her slowly, gently from side to side.

He remember lullabies, he realised, as they tripped from his lips, words that he had last sung to Bae, so many years ago. He remembered holding another child, smaller, more fragile, and he remembered loving that child so intensely that he thought he might die of it.

Aurora was quieting against his chest, but he kept singing, soft, his voice trembling, and he was both shocked and pained to realise there were tears on his face. Tears for the son lost, tears for the child in his arm that was not and could never be his, tears for the woman who trusted him to keep them both safe.

They couldn’t stay.

It was a horrifying and painful realisation.

If they stayed, that meant Bae was put aside, and Bae could never, ever be put aside. Bae was his, his, and no one else’s. Bae was his blood, his son, his child, his heart, his soul, his conscience, his everything. Bae was the reason he lived and breathed, and as long as Belle and her daughter were in his life, Bae wasn’t, and that… that wasn’t right.

“Hush, little dearie,” he whispered, rocking Aurora, who was burbling softly. “Hush. You will be safe, and your mama will be safe.” He bowed his head over her and pressed his lips to her downy head. “I swear it.”

For once, something he cared about would be safe. 

For once, he would not be there to destroy it all.

 

____________________________________________

 

“I don’t understand.”

Rumpelstiltskin walked in a circle around Belle. “What’s to understand, dearie?” he asked, making a grand gesture to the building around them. “This is yours.”

Belle had Aurora tucked into a sling, and one arm was supporting the child. She rocked the baby as she looked around. They were in a modest townhouse, simple, with two rooms and an alcove over the kitchen. The walls were polish wood. The windows gleamed. The sunlight filtered through lace curtains. There was gold enough to buy the town the house rested in, sealed in small chests.

“Why would I need this?” she asked. “We have a deal.”

He shrugged, avoiding her gaze. “You have a family, dearie,” he said. “You deserve better than the life of a servant.”

“You’re breaking our deal?” she said quietly. 

For a split-second, he looked at her, then away. “No,” he said with absolute certainty. “This is a new deal.” He waved towards the parlour, the wheel that sat there. “I’m offering you a home for you and your child, where you can be a spinner and your own mistress. You will be safe here, protected, at peace.”

“And your price?” she said, cradling her daughter, as if she might be stolen away.

He hesitated by the mantle, tracing his fingers along the stonework. “That you do not speak of me and of what you know of me.”

Belle was silent for so long that he could not bear it.

Finally, she said, “Why?”

“You ask me that so often, dearie,” he said quietly, unable to face looking around.

“I still want to know,” she murmured. “Please?”

He hesitated, tapping the edge of one of the stones. “There was a father, once,” he said, barely loud enough to be heard. “He loved his son. He did foolish, reckless things to protect him, and because of that, he lost his son.” He swallowed hard. “I’m a dangerous man, Belle. I put people in danger. I drive them away. I hurt them. I don’t want that to be your fate.”

He heard her approach and almost flinched when she laid her hand on his shoulder. 

“Look at me,” she said quietly. “Rumpelstiltskin, look at me.”

He turned to face her, feeling more lost than he had ever expected. Her eyes were bright, clear and understanding. She had a child. She knew what the most desperate would do to protect what was theirs.

“I accept your deal,” she said. “On one condition.”

“Name it,” he said hoarsely.

She lifted a hand to touch his cheek. “You are Aurora’s guardian,” she said. “If anything should or would happen to me, I want no one else to claim her.”

He lifted his hand to cover hers. “I promise I will do a far better job than any fairy Godmother,” he said with only a little maliciousness. 

Belle rose on her toes then and pressed a brief, warm kiss to his lips. “A deal, then,” she said. Her hand slipped down to squeeze his shoulder. “And if you should ever need a refuge, at any time, this place will be it.”

He smiled as if it might happen, but inwardly, he knew it never ever would. 

His only true refuge was solitude.


End file.
